


JAOA - Reflections

by Gail Riordan (lferion)



Series: JAOA [25]
Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, Grief, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2001-02-01
Updated: 2001-02-01
Packaged: 2017-10-09 13:50:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/88144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lferion/pseuds/Gail%20Riordan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Amidala reflects on news from the Temple</p>
            </blockquote>





	JAOA - Reflections

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a companion piece to BlackRose's 'Remembrance and Loss'. Many thanks to her for letting me play in her sandbox.
> 
> Disclaimer: George Lucas is god and owns everything ... except this weird permutation which is just for fun and I doubt  
> he'd want it. All JAOA-specific things belong to Black Rose, I but embroider on her rich cloth.
> 
> /These are thoughts/

Year of the Republic 25,003-4 (exact date unconfirmed)

 

Amidala was surprised at how strongly she felt when she heard the news, though she allowed nothing to show until her attendant had left and the holoscreen was dark. Master Qui-Gon Jinn, gone, passed into the Force, dead. She had expected to feel for Anakin, have sympathy for Obi-Wan's loss. She was surprised to discover herself grieved, bereft, feeling loss of her own.

The news was not unexpected; he had been very ill for a long time. Indeed, the release from suffering was undoubtably a relief for all, but still....

Pictures rose in her mind, images of memory and sense.

The first rescue, 'If only that were so', '_I_ don't approve' Did he _know_? (Of course he had, but at what point?) 'We'll deal with of this.' That battle's aftermath, the terror and relief of each official communication during the Wars, witnessing a look, a stolen moment of tenderness with Obi-Wan, her and Ani's wedding, the image of Councilor Jinn holding both twins with an utterly besotted look on his face. How fragile but still so alive when Leia went to the Temple and the deep resonance of his voice not only in her ears but in her heart as he gave her the promise she had insisted on....

Somehow she had known almost from the beginning that the semblance of Jedi dispassion he wore was just that, a semblance, a garment put on and off like a cloak, like her royal facepaint, and had little to do with his core of passionate serenity.

When she had taken Leia to the Temple she had been shocked at the changes only two years had wrought, disturbed and nearly angry that Obi-Wan and even Anakin didn't appear to notice how changed, for all she could see the care they took. He had spoken to her of small things, (worried Obi-Wan with his expense of breath &amp; strength), holding her small warm hand in his own cold one. She could still feel the brittle texture of his fingers, big bones covered by too little flesh, as gentle and speaking in weakness as they had been in strength.

He had been up and about, always the Jedi Master, reassuringly sharp and present, but she had seen the toll exacted by his illness, how slender his resources actually were. How he had allowed Leia (her wise, solemn angel-girl, who had adopted him instantly) to - oh so carefully in both hands! - bring him tea, and pillows and then sit, curled and intensely quiet in his lap, her dark head nestled always on his left shoulder, on the couch in the common room. Young and old, resting together in company.

She had realized only later that he had known he was dying, would not see her again in flesh.

Would it have been easier if he had died at the Sith's hand? For the Queen of Naboo, yes. She had known him so little, then, and much of that irritating. She would have probably been very near relieved. And later, she and he had had some fine disagreements, Queen to Councilor, Master and affianced, two strong, intelligent and passionate people. But even at the height of argument he had never dealt with her as less or other than a whole person. It might have been easier, but it would not have been _better_. The Queen found it appropriate to sorrow, but Amidala was genuinely grieved.

And for Anakin, for Obi-Wan? Neither easier nor better; without Master Jinn continuing in their lives they would be very different people now. /Only Jedi, not _people_/ a corner of her mind whispered /crippled, passionless *Jedi*./

She sat for an unmeasured time, alone and quiet in the bright stillness of her private sanctum, feeling somehow as though the very sunlight had been dimmed by some incalculable fraction. Then the quick patter of small feet interrupted her reverie and she could not but smile: Here was her son, her little sun, come to her with blond brows drawn tight over big eyes, rosebud mouth frowning.

"Why are you sad, Mama? Has something happened to Papa?"

"No, angel. Your father is fine." Not quite a lie, except he wasn't, not really, though she trusted he would be. The tone and stiffness of the message told her that he was taking this loss harder than either of them had anticipated. As she was. But what of Luke? What to tell him, and how? Luke had gone to Coruscant, had seen his sister's new home, had gazed with solemn attention at the big man kneeling carefully down to his eye level and had not squirmed beneath the hand that ruffled his pale bright hair. She reached out and repeated the gesture herself, tremendously aware of the softness of the strands against her fingers. "Papa will be fine," she repeated gently. "But we have lost someone he, and I, both loved." How much would a little boy remember of someone who had been both far away and ill for most of his four-almost-five years?

"Leia is sad, too," the childish treble offered. Her lap was suddenly full of wiry little boy. "Gran-da Qui-Gon's gone away-away, hasn't he."

Enough. He remembered and knew enough. She pressed a kiss to the top of his head and held him snug within the circle of her arms. "Yes, angel-love. Away-away."

And she would miss him.


End file.
